TAMPA, Fla. — Cuba is just 90 miles from Florida, but its history and future are deeply tied to Tampa’s story.
In Ybor City, where Cuban cigar workers helped transform a small Gulf town into a thriving city, the connection is still alive today.
WATCH: From Havana to Florida: A historic bond facing an uncertain future
At the J.C. Newman Cigar Company, the last large working cigar factory in the United States, history isn’t preserved behind glass, it’s still alive. This factory and this neighborhood exist because of Cuba. In the late 1800s, cigar maker Vicente Martinez Ybor brought Cuban workers here, transforming Tampa from a sleepy Gulf outpost into a booming city.
Now, as political pressure on Cuba increases and uncertainty grows about what comes next, Tampa Bay 28 anchor Paul LaGrone speaks with Victor DiMaio, the President of the Hillsborough County Democratic Hispanic Caucus. They take a deeper look at where Cuba has been, where is stands today, and what its future could mean for families and businesses here in Florida.
Paul: If you understand Tampa, you have to understand Cuba, right?
Victor: Actually, you know, the reason we're here is because of the cigar workers that are sitting behind us today. You know, you think you know what's going on in Cuba, but you really don't know. Unless you really go there and see with your own two eyes what's going on and talk to the people around, you really don't know.
After several decades of U.S. sanctions, the relationship between the U.S. and Cuba remains frozen in time. Now the Trump administration with Secretary of State Marco Rubio is applying pressure on Cuba, partly through its ties to Venezuela.
Paul: What exactly is the endgame there for Cuba from the U.S. perspective, do you think we're trying to force a new opening so that we can reestablish a relationship with Cuba?
Victor: The honest answer is I don't think anybody knows. I don't think Marco Rubio knows. I don't think Mr. Cornelison, who runs a government down there in Cuba knows. I don't even think Donald Trump knows. Having gone to Cuba, having been Cuban myself, knowing the people on both sides of the fence and the Cuba issue, I don't see a lot of change. I think you know, the sad part about Cuba's history, at least for the last 65 years, is that we've had this embargo against this country, which no other country in the world has suffered. I mean, I always use the analogy that, you know, China is a communist country. They have a totalitarian system. Why don't we why don't you embargo, you know, have a deal against them or Russia?
Paul: And I know that's how they've had to do it. And they can do it. But do they want to do it? Do you think there's an appetite in Cuba with the people there for a change, and to have this relationship with the United States that could lead to economic opportunity, not just there, but obviously here too, including Tampa?
Victor: Well, you know, I was fortunate to be part of a delegation that went to Cuba for example, the last days of the Obama administration when President Obama went to Cuba and the Tampa Bay rays actually played baseball in Cuba. And we had a Cuban baseball player on the team at the time. So, during that time, when the embargo was cracked a little bit to allow people to travel. It was a mysterious country, a country that people we had ships leaving directly from Tampa to Havana. Hundreds of thousands, if not a million people, went to Cuba for the very first time, and traveled there and stayed there and ate there and lived there. I mean, it's and I saw the look on the people's faces, the Cubans, they were so happy at the time they were making money.
Paul: Their ambition might be more than that. Let's say, somehow ending communism and introducing a whole new way of life in Cuba. Do you think that's impossible, or can the Cuban people get past, communism, which is been a way of life for so long? Is that something you can extract out of the culture there?
Victor: Well, first of all, I don't support the government of Cuba. I support the people of Cuba. And I think of the people what the people have to decide what they have to decide what they want. And I kind of again, going back to the example of China, you have to understand that the people in Cuba are in a system that that's pretty much all they know.
Paul: What do you think the possibility would be, the potential for opportunity? When you look at that in your dreams, you know, what? What do you see? There, not just for Cuban people, but for Florida as well. And it would seem that Florida would benefit the most to have that relationship.
Victor: Well, if you if you dumped the embargo tomorrow, let's say you got rid of the embargo. What you have to understand is this the embargo against this, against Cuba is a U.S. embargo against Cuba. The Cubans want a trade war that they really do. They don't want this embargo. This is the United States embargo. This isn't the Cuban embargo against the United States. This is the United States embargo against Cuba. So, the Cubans, if you go down there, if you talk to Cubans, you meet the Cubans. They want to trade with us. They want to do business with us. They don't like this embargo any more than anyone 20 else. So, this embargo was imposed by a lot of people left Cuba. This is not about freedom. This is about vengeance. Trying to get back at losing whatever they lost. There's a lot of people that had business in Cuba. They had property or had, buildings, whatever.
Paul: So you have to let go of some of the past.
Victor: Yes.
Today the future of Cuba itself remains uncertain as political pressure is mounting, and economic pressure is growing. But as Victor reminds us real and lasting change can’t be forced from the outside, it has to come from within.
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Tampa Bay 28 Anchor Paul LaGrone grew up in Plant City, so he’s seen firsthand how that part of Hillsborough County has changed over the years. As Tampa Bay 28’s leading political anchor he knows state and local politics impact decisions we make at home. Paul wants to hear how state policies impact you. Just use the form below to send him a message.
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